


Don't

by peachapologist



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Background Relationships, Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, M/M, One Shot, little blood warning just in case, they're in love harold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-12-04 19:47:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11562096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachapologist/pseuds/peachapologist
Summary: Shiro shouldn't make promises he can't keep, Lance scolds him, but he makes them anyway so he has something to chase."In sickness and in health..." He rasps in a little voice and the same little smile to go with."To love and to cherish," his lover continued for him, watering eyes threatening to spill but too determined to give up...."I do."





	Don't

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written in so long. this is a healing fic for my friend Andy, who has a beautiful heart, I hope this cheesy story's good enough to heal at least a bit! :) who knew my first on here would /not/ be a klance? I guess I love you so much ♡ this one's for you dada

_I'm back and I'm better_  
_I want you bad as ever_  
_Don't let me just let up_  
_I wanna give you better_  
_Baby, it's what—_

"Whatever." Lance hits the pause button with his thumb gently, instead of the black square otherwise meaning stop. Because he'll carry on listening to it later. Because he's kind of guilty thinking about having imagined Shiro sing the words. Because, maybe, he wants to hold onto the hope that's flown halfway across space.

His next actions contradict his thoughts.

In a couple of minutes (doboshes, he still needs getting used to) Lance is banging on Pidge's door, thundering, "Pidge, I need you to open up right now."

When said friend comes into view as the door slides open, Lance momentarily forgets why he is here. At first, Pidge has an expression of disgruntled annoyance, until she realises Lance doesn't barge in like he usually does. He stands awkwardly with his blue shoulders bunched up, looking like the colour of his raglan shirt and Pidge understands there is something up.

"Um, your music player?" Lance shakes the rectangular device in his hand. While he purposely takes off the headset from around his neck to delay himself, Pidge stays quiet as she is patient.

She even helps him through it. Jabbing a finger into his rib and earning a yelp, Pidge heaves loudly: "About time! I lent you it  _light ages_ ago and thought you'd never give it back."

He laughs nervously, rubbing his nape. "I'm sorry." She smiles lightly. "I just, just wanted to return it."

"That's all?"

That's sure why he had threatened to kick her door down?

"Yeah." He answers almost immediately, turning away to head back to his room.

That's when Pidge "accidentally" plays the current song on the iPod. Lance stops in his tracks. The earphones are still plugged in but Lance likes listening with the volume on full, thus the music is muffled but audible enough for the both of them to hear a tune without comprehensible words. Lance recognises the tune in order to put the lyrics together though, and in this space of recognition, Pidge silently thinks that it's nice because it is like a private thing belonging to Lance. But he is acting like he needs to share it.

"Lance. It's... You're a walking contradiction." Pidge pushes the pair of specs further up her nose. It's something else they're talking about. She doesn't keep quiet about it. "It's something else, isn't it?" Her voice comes out soft. Lance isn't made of hard walls, needs a harder voice to break through into or yearns too much prying. Lance is honest, the softest boy you'll ever meet and says it like it is. He just needs time, she thinks, as well as an ear to listen to him. The music is still playing.

_"Nice, Lance!" Shiro growls with excitement like that of a proud boyfriend, a smile in his voice, "That's why we bring our sharpshooter."_

_Lance, eyes shut because he's blissed out, feeling safe because of the compliment, mumbles a small "yup" under his breath._

_Shiro's lips twitch into a straight line when he realises the impending disturbance from Slav will distract him even from sharing with Lance the shortest victory kiss. And he doesn't worry about Pidge because, well, Pidge knows._

"I miss home." There is a slight whine in the back of his throat, he feels his eyes sting and Lance realises that is not all as Pidge's stare is, for a second, judging. "I miss him so much."

 _We all do_ , she wants to say. But that's obvious. Everyone is trying. Coran is getting little to no sleep reading piles upon piles of old books stored in the castle's library to find every possible way of locating Shiro and that's only known because she's been staying up too. Allura's bossier than usual but they all need it; Pidge thinks if her hair isn't already white it'll turn whiter. Hunk's food is sweeter than normal, a bit too much, as if he's pouring everything into his cooking. Keith is even broodier than broody from time before they all got together, but where he's lacking in mood he makes up for in being a new leader. Everyone is trying hard. And Lance is trying the hardest.

Lance is acting exactly the same as normal, like Shiro has just gone on vacation.

Everyone isn't fooled for a second—none dubbing him selfish and oblivious to the absence. They stay silent because they believe it's his way of coping. Nobody except the paladins, later the princess and her advisor, can tell there is a difference in Lance: he fights with Keith often noisily but mostly just bickering; he flirts with all girls and pretty aliens; he picks on Pidge's techie dialect still; he praises Hunk's inedible cookies because Hunk is his  _favourite_ ; nags in a different, more exasperating way than Allura does, like a worried mother. Lance continues to talk about Shiro like he's telling stories of a hero to his children.

It works, since everybody's then sharing a fond smile at the warm recollections. Lance is fooled, because it works for seconds prior to all remembering he is hurting for them and they hide their winces.

What breaks Pidge's heart the most, as if she has an extra heart in those ribs to break, is when they had brought aide to a kingdom whose king has a gorgeous princess daughter, then after wooing her, Lance goes, "it's more fun with Shiro not around 'cause I don't get scolded like, too much!" She remembers staring at him for a split second before rebuking " _I'll_ scold you!" with a poke to the chest and a false smile. He says that only once, though.

"I'm sorry, Pidge, you've got Matt and Sam to worry about and I'm just adding more stress onto you with this. I should have gone to Hunk—"

"I really feel like slapping you at the moment but I always say no to violence," Pidge drawls.

Lance laughs, "now, you know that's not true!"

"I'm a pacifist." She places a hand over her chest dramatically, breathing a deep sigh. "Look, Lance, it's okay. We're all missing somebody if not more than one person. Everybody has a family," she repeats what Keith has taught her. It's unspoken between them that they are not talking about the princess of that kingdom they have recently paid a visit. "And—I feel like you guys didn't get the clear message—you're all my family too. What's important is that we work together." She drops the smile into a serious glare. "We'll find them."

He feels weights lifted off his body. "I'm glad I went to you."

Pidge smiles for a moment, before her lips curl into a smirk. "You're just saying that because Hunk's spending so much time with Keith, you don't have any spare time with him!"

"Keith's Shiro's brother. Hunk's my best friend." Lance stares responsively with dull eyes. "It'd be insensitive and I don't want to interrupt what they've built."

His friend nods. "That's why you came to me, but. Know that they're there for you as much as I am."

"Thank you. I'm sorry for bothering you so late, I'll let you sleep." Does Lance even sleep at all nowadays?

"Don't be stupid," Pidge whispers. She grows tormented it'll be stage one all over again. Lance has to stop blaming himself. He's not alone, it's imperative he has to know that he's got friends who will always have his back.

"Tomorrow we'll work on finding him again. All three of them. I hope everybody gets some rest tonight, or you'll have premature wrinkles."

The green paladin keeps a relieved exhale from being let out and she finds a smile light up her face again.

But what he says leads her to notice the darker layers of crescents under his eyes. He walks away. "You should worry about yourself more, Lance."

* * *

"I know, this is where you go," Lance sing-songs, "you are more beautiful than the stars!" He flops onto his back.

"You're jumping there," Shiro chuckles at Lance's pout. He leans on his elbow. Not taking his eyes off the other's bottom lip, he carries on murmuring: "It goes something like 'the stars look beautiful tonight. Do you know what else is beautiful?'" Lance wants to die. He refrains from obeying his mind telling him to whisper  _what else_. Shiro says nothing for too long a few seconds, _how can he be such a jerk_ , and Lance raises his fist to jokingly punch his chest but Shiro catches it in his larger grip. "And you're more beautiful than the stars," he says in a half-assed way, admitting with a smirk. It's teasing jokes until the true answer shows as he envelopes Lance into a slow kiss, pressing his lips against Lance's soft ones.

He doesn't hate games so much when he's playing with Shiro. Lance withdraws from the kiss luckily before there can be an obscene "pop" sound, because Shiro has already started to deepen it. All the while ignoring Shiro's puppy eyes, his hand forms a reversed "L" and he reaches it up to the indigo sky above their heads. "I used to do this as a kid. Laid back in the garden, my hand like this; tried to find how many times the stars could fit along my fingers." By the time he wants to demonstrate, Shiro already copies the gun-like shape made by his right hand with his left in advance. Lance shows what he means by tracing his fingertip along the latter's index and thumb. "This space here." He grins. "Nothing special, really, if not totally random!" For some reason he quickly grows embarrassed. "There was nothing to do since I got bored of Gabriela's toys and Diego was always at work, never home. Nobody even plays a game like this because I made it up."

"I think that's what makes it special. It's unique," says Shiro with a raised eyebrow, like he is deep in thought. "Like you."

He pecks Lance and the smaller boy pushes his mouth away with both hands, giggling in a voice roughened by Shiro's tickles to his belly. "God, you're so cheesy! Also, what's with the cactus stubble? It's prickly on my maiden cheeks."

But Lance is beaming then with eyes filled with stars. Literal stars, Shiro reverberates in his mind; they're reflecting off the blue of his irises from the twinkling white crowds of dots laid out above them.

It feels like they're close to home.

There're diamonds clustered above their very heads and Shiro's staring at the brunette like he's not surrounded by ancient architecture and advanced alien technology. Like Lance is the only masterpiece worth remembering in this wide room. Lance rolls over so he is half-laying on top of Shiro's chest, bless, peers into his grey eyes with a shallow expression as if effortlessly he's looking at his lover's soul.

"You're looking like there's nothing that you won't do," Lance speaks in a lowered voice although they're the only ones in the planetarium, stopping inches away from giving Shiro the nth kiss today. His facial features settle into something coy. "But seriously, Shiro, can you shave?"

* * *

"Shiro, let's do it."

Lance clamps a hand over the older boy's bicep, the inside of Lance's knuckles fitting perfectly along the dips in his left arm, shaking it weakly.

"I, take you, Takashi Shirogane," he presses on gently.

With a bleeding man in his arms, he has no choice. Lance's blood is on his hands, where he intends to stop the wound from flowing with it. Because the paladin's suit has malfunctioned, been damaged beyond repair with a ragged hole where it should be able to mend itself and heal the wearer to a certain degree, on the right side of his ribcage. If he had gotten the choice, he'd still do it. He hears his name and he smiles.

"For my lawful husband," Shiro, agonised that he cannot pull him closer but just embrace him loosely, forces through his shuddering jaw, "to have and to hold."

Lance's voice is reduced to a whisper. "From this day forward... for better, for worse... For richer, for poorer." He smiles even though the pain is overwhelming. Shiro has spoiled him with jewelled rings; it's time to say yes. Shiro has given him flowers resembling bluebells, telling him they remind him of Lance. Shiro has visited planets on missions teamed with the other paladins or alone, coming back with a present each and every time. "In sickness and in health..." He rasps in a little voice and the same little smile to go with.

"To love and to cherish," his lover continued for him, watering eyes threatening to spill but too determined to give up. Lance is trying with all he's got left, but the boy was struggling to catch a breath. Shiro chases it for him. "Till death do us part." Like a finale, Shiro weeps for the first time in front of the blue boy. He weeps like it's his last breath to catch. Weeping, like the flower he has given Lance but the latter has long since watered it back at the castle bedroom, on his dressing table.

Lance's thin eyebrows scrunch up in the middle, but the expression looks painful more than he wishes it to look angry. "Even after that," he insists in the smallest voice, but his words are loud. They're the only clear noises in the aftermath of war and smoke. Shiro nods desperately.

Lance is pale now, the beautiful dark glow of his skin nowhere to be found over his broken body. And Shiro misses it too much already, it's not a laughable joke; anytime now Lance should pop out of this sad play and complain about the whereabouts of his skincare items; how dare he let himself join Shiro in being way damn sappy. He misses it so much.

"Even after that."

"I do."

Shiro panics. "I just got to have you back, this isn't—"

"More like I just got  _you_ back," Lance retorts, wheezing a chortle between trying to get his voice higher than a whisper, but his chest hurts with every millisecond the wound opens further. "You came back, so I can finally rest and... stop annoying everyone."

"It's not fair," Shiro stresses, sobbing like the boy he is meant to be. Finally for once, he's not so used to  _life's not fair_. Why does losing your beloved hurt so much more than being thrown around a gladiator ring? It hurts beyond the physical loss and humiliation you feel surrounded by the enemy's laughter, missing a limb. Why does it hurt more than losing an arm? Losing your mind?

"It's cold." Shiro laughs through clenched teeth at that. It makes Lance's palm slide from his cheek. The world is cold.

Shiro manages to tear his eyes away from Lance to beg with the sky, crying. "According to God's holy law. In the presence of God I make this vow," he speaks breathlessly, like he's racing with time. "I do." He glances at Lance's pretty sleeping face and back up at the clear blue, cloudless, staring back at him emptily. "I do, please. I do. Please... Please!"

The war is won but they have nothing worth celebrating.

* * *

Hunk throws him a look as he passes by, one he doesn't glimpse with his chin unintentionally high.

He walks past an open door, Pidge inside tinkering with a bot. She raises a hand as a wave, to which he nods, but he doesn't disturb her as she seems busy.

"Looking sharp, my boy!"

Shiro's head registers the last two syllables with distinct, different ones for a moment. He recognises the head of ginger before he can hear his heart break a little more. Coran considers him with a different thoughtfulness, one he gets along well with usually. He doesn't realise he's not communicating with the others as well. He laughs easily, "Coran, I'm not a boy anymore."

"Ah, but you'll always be a boy to me. Not to say I'm old or anything!" He taps his crooked nose. "Going off to a party?"

"Yes," he lies. Well, it is a half lie because he will be attending one. "Later tonight." Iverson had invited him to celebrate signing the first trade with outer space allies.

"Well, I hope you use the time between now and then to relax." But even the Altean's voice is strained. Shiro doesn't notice nonetheless. Shiro's cheerful demeanour has taken a toll on his circle of friends, even the sunniest.

Shiro has kept his face clean shaven, cutting the unwanted stubble away every four days like he's on a schedule. He's had his shirt tailored with a tighter fitting, flexible and more presentable material. Whenever he fastens his sight on the smallest scratch or stain, Shiro whisks away to get his clothes patched up or washed like a man on a mission. The first week is difficult, but now he is eating healthy since earth food is back on his plate, mixed with alien dishes from occasional galactic meetings, and fitter than ever before.

He's made his way to the medical wing, closing his eyes briefly before entering. It looks like Keith and Allura are conversing about something serious, but he refrains from asking out of politeness. They quieten upon his presence anyway, not like he pays attention to that ongoing behaviour with every one of his friends. Unfortunately, he doesn't distinguish the bags under Keith's eyes have darkened and Allura's are slightly red. It is difficult for them to bring their eyes to a friend who will never wake up. Without a word, he stands in front of the only healing pod that is carrying a subject.

Allura is behind him. "I've told you this," she starts, keeping her expression from sounding as irritated as she feels, Allura's irritability stemming from Shiro's stubborn bearing. _But I have to again_. "The healing pods can rid someone of wounds. They cannot bring back the dead." Her voice is gentle with a harsh truth.

The first time he had heard this, Keith intervened upon worry for the face his brother had shown. "You were kept alive in there for ten thousand years!"

"Alteans have a long lifespan." Allura had replied in a steely tone. It had hurt her to paint her voice like that, but the truth had to be received. "Lance is human."

Only a week following that inevitable day, everything had returned to normal. His visible grief had lasted a week long. He had no such thing as an appetite to eat. One spoonful each meal had been tasteless on his tongue, and his tongue was not functioning to talk. There had been no wink of sleep. His friends are too stunned to ask why the sudden change overnight. Since the end of that week, he's acted like nothing of a tragedy ever happened. Now he looks his best.

Five weeks going onto six. Lance's wounds have healed fully, the hole in his torso replaced by a scar shaped like a starburst. Even the bruises that were extremely hard to look at are gone. But the others know better. The dim, blue hued light from inside makes him glow like an angel. His face is peaceful.

Allura and Keith withdraw from the room, the princess departing first before Keith who stays to have a moment's talk with Shiro. Not before she mutters sorrily, "he is as stubborn as you, I see it now."

Keith squeezes his brother's shoulder with meaning. "You should get some rest, Shiro, everyone's worried about you."

Lance will not forgive him if he doesn't take care of himself.

He has pretended not to perceive his friends' worried gazes, because in doing so he has truthfully become no longer aware. He has known Keith, Pidge, Hunk, Coran and Allura think he is putting futile hope into Lance seeing him again. Matt, his best friend, has shouted at him in a period where they have fallen out due to Shiro's obsession with keeping up with appearances but Shiro has not blown up in return. "It's been more than a month. We can't keep him in there forever, it's not right!" Matt forces himself to accept that Shiro's life now is healthy, knowing the latter too wayward to give up. They have since made up. Still, Shiro knows they don't believe him. He is not their leader anymore. He is just a man waiting for a miracle.

Now he is on his own with the blue paladin in this room.

Shiro has faith. There may be no man up in the sky, but Shiro believes in Lance.

Yet sometimes he questions whether believing for too long will lead him to delirium because he sees the illusion of a cloud of Lance's breath on the other side of the glass, a tick before he shuts his eyes for a nap.

"Takashi?"

Shiro wants to sob when he is dragged out of his dream, from the soothing voice belonging only in that world.

His eyes widen at the sight before him and his heart does not stop, only beating faster.

He quickly realises he'll be cancelling the plans to celebrate elsewhere.

Lance falls out of the healing pod, and Shiro catches him with his left arm so the first thing he can feel is warmth.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been having the worst writer's block and wanting to gift you something back especially in this time, although it'll not be half as great as yours, made me determined to overcome it. sorry it's not very amazing but I hope you like.. ; [prayer hands]


End file.
